Blame It on the Bachelor

He was furious, and yet he was filled with an unwilling admiration for her as well as lust. She had definitely called his bluff. “You’re a world-class witch,” he said to Kylie.

“I’m really not.” Was there a hint of apology in her tone?

He let out a bark of laughter as he buttoned his jacket and held his glass strategically in front of himself.

“I was only trying to make—” She broke off, looking—of all things—abashed.

He didn’t buy the act for a second. “Make what, darlin’?” he asked sardonically.

She hesitated. “A point.”

That hadn’t been what she was going to say. He knew it instinctively. “Well, you did.” He looked down at his crotch. “You made your point and now I’m stuck with it,” he said bitterly. “Thanks.”

“I’ll help you with that,” she said, evidently emboldened again. “Really. Just meet me in the utility closet in five.”

He gritted his teeth and leaned forward so that his lips almost brushed her ear. He could smell her honeysuckle shampoo, her light floral perfume, the clean scent of her skin. “Not even if the fate of the free world depended on it.”

Kylie gulped the last of her champagne. Was it his imagination, or was her lip trembling?

He didn’t care. “But you go ahead to that closet. You just hop on your broomstick and enjoy yourself, sweetheart. You hear?”

With that parting shot, Dev turned on his heel and walked away without compunction—still horny as all get-out.

Damn her.

3

KYLIE WAS SHAKING INSIDE, though she wore her smile like armor. What was wrong with her, that she couldn’t even score with a bona fide man-whore like Devon McKee? His reputation preceded him. Everyone knew he had no standards; that given the chance he’d do a day-old bagel.

And yet he’d turned her down, despite the fact that she’d lost her mind and talked to him like a professional phone-sex operator.

The cocktail hour was drawing to a close and soon everyone would take their assigned seats for dinner. She was on the verge of tears. She had to pull herself together.

Kylie lifted yet another glass of champagne—her third—from a waiter’s tray and wobbled towards the ladies’ room again, with the idea of shutting herself into a stall until she’d calmed down. But the entire flock of bridesmaids got there before she did, leaving her no option … except, perhaps, the infamous utility closet.

A quick scan of the hallway told her she was alone, so she walked quickly to the door, pulled it open and slipped inside, feeling around for a light switch as she closed herself in.

Far from being alone with a sexy ex-rocker, she had as her companions an industrial carpet steamer, a cart stocked with cleaning products and bathroom tissue, and a vacuum the size of a Chevrolet.

Kylie leaned her forehead against one of the dingy, pockmarked walls and closed her eyes against the sting of rejection. It wasn’t really Devon’s rejection that hurt, of course—it was the long months of feeling inadequate in her relationship, helpless at the erosion of Jack’s love as drugs and sexual fantasy consumed him.

Devon’s dismissal of her was the last straw. Kylie gulped the entire glass of champagne and set the flute on the cleaning cart. She took a deep breath. Then another.

I will not cry. I will absolutely not cry. I will under no circumstances cry.

I am a strong, fabulous woman with a great job in banking. I will be an assistant vice president soon, then a regional vice president of the bank one day. If I can’t have a fulfilling personal life, then I will have a meteoric career.

There is no reason for me to be skulking in a broom closet!

I will not cry…

Oh, hell. Did salt water stain silk? She was going to ruin her dress. Kylie grabbed a roll of toilet paper from the cleaning cart and unwound enough to mummify her entire head. She buried her face in it.

Judging by the black streaks on the tissue, her mascara was running, damn it. She had to stop this pathetic mewling immediately.

Bank executives did not behave this way.

She straightened her spine and looked upward, blinking rapidly to get rid of the tears in her eyes. She smacked her own cheeks lightly. She cleared her throat.

“I am woman,” Kylie said out loud. “Hear me roar.”

Of course that was the moment when the closet door opened, and Devon McKee stood staring down at her, his dark eyebrows raised quizzically.

“Roar?” he asked.

Really, why couldn’t the floor swallow her up?

“I heard some sniffling,” he said, “but definitely no roaring.”

“Figure of speech.” She tried to brush past him—but he didn’t move.

Instead, he closed the door behind them, forcing her to step back. “What’s the matter, darlin’?”

“Nothing. I—I need to go find my seat. They’ll start serving dinner any minute, now.”

“Word of advice?”

“What?” she asked gruffly.

“Clean up your face a little better. It looks like a kid’s finger painting. Here, let me help.” He cupped her face in his hands and rubbed gently under her eyes with his thumbs. He brushed at her cheeks with his fingers. And then he dabbed at her mouth with a piece of the bathroom tissue.

Mortifying though the situation was, the warmth—and was it tenderness?—of his hands sent shivers of renegade pleasure down her spine and brought heat to the surface of her face and neck.

“That’s better,” Devon said. “Not that you weren’t the most gorgeous human finger painting alive.”

She managed a self-deprecating snuffle.

“Now, do you want to tell ol’ Dev why you’re crying in this closet?”

“Not crying,” she muttered.

“Riiiight. So, do you want to tell me why you’re squeezing joy and happiness out of your eyes in secret, then?” She shook her head.

“I see. Well, I just want to make sure that all this, um, euphoria isn’t because of something that a nasty pecker-head said to you a few minutes ago in defense of his own ego.”

“Of course not,” she said emphatically.

“I’m so relieved. I mean, this really sets my mind at ease,” said Devon, frowning at her.

“Good.”

He looked around the closet. “It’s clear to me, in that case, that you came in here to have fun with your broomstick, as the nasty pecker-head suggested.”

Kylie’s lips quivered in spite of her mood.

“But it’s gone,” he pointed out. “So …”

She met his eyes, which were twinkling ruefully. “The carpet steamer was more than adequate.”

“Ah. Need a cigarette now, do you?”

She nodded.

He patted his pockets.

“Actually, I don’t smoke.”

They stood looking at each other for a long moment, and she had to admit that if any guy could carry off leather pants, it most certainly was Devon McKee.

“I’m sorry,” she said.

“I’m sorry,” he said simultaneously.

They both laughed.

“I’m not normally a slut or a tease,” Kylie added.

“That’s a real shame. What was it about me that brought out those admirable, delightful qualities?”

Her face flash-fried. She didn’t answer.

“I don’t normally play hard to get,” Dev said. “But I’m usually in the driver’s seat, so to speak. This was a whole new ball game.”

“Yeah … listen, we really should get back out there.” Once again, Kylie tried to maneuver her way out of the closet.

Once again, Dev blocked her way, this time, by simply stretching his arms across the narrow breadth of the closet and putting his palms flat on each wall.

Kylie eyed him nervously.

“Not that it wasn’t refreshing, but I prefer to do the seducing,” he said with a predatory grin.

My, but he had a lot of very white teeth. Rather wolfish ones, truth to tell.

She swallowed nervously, all of her former bravado having deserted her. She was locked in a closet with a guy she didn’t really know, and she’d teased him shamelessly.

Dev’s arm shot out and he caught her around the back of her neck, under her hair. Her stomach flipped as he drew her inexorably toward him. She was barely aware of her feet moving, or of her knees shaking as he bent his head to hers.

His lips sent liquid fire shooting through her veins, and they parted hers easily. He delved into her mouth, his other hand slipping down her back, over the thin silk of her dress. He pulled her against him, hard, and his hand drifted lower, cupping her bottom and then curving up again.

“You lied,” he said. “You are wearing panties. A thong.”

He slid his fingers up, under her dress, and the heat of him against her bare flesh shocked and excited her.

“So smooth,” he murmured. “So soft.”

She gasped as he dipped under the thong, into the cleft of her backside and down to the most private area of her body. The pleasure exquisite, it sent erotic ripples all over her body. He released her nape and picked her up with both hands, her skirt rucked up and the core of her snug against the hardness of him.

His breath came hot and shallow against her lips as he rocked against her, doing through their clothing what he wanted to do naked.

Through her dress, her breasts rubbed against his shirt, aching and wanting.

Supporting her weight with his left hand, he went back to cause more sensual trouble with his right. He dipped under her thong again, stroking and rubbing.

The sensations held her at gunpoint, taut and caught on a moan and shivering at the possibility of what he might do next.

Devon bit her lower lip gently and slid two fingers into her, still teasing her core with his thumb.

Unintelligible noises came from her own mouth, and she finally tore away from his. “You can’t— We can’t— You have to put me down!”

“Why?” asked Devon, and did something even more disturbing and wonderful.

“Because—aaahhhhh…”

“I thought you wanted me to do you.”

“Ohhhhhhhhhhh. No, stop! Wait, don’t stop—”

“Am I doing you wrong?”

“Nooooooooo!”

“Then what’s the problem?” He cleared space on the cleaning cart by knocking a bunch of bath tissue off it, then set her down. He fished in his pocket for his wallet and took out a condom. While she caught her breath, he unzipped his pants and rolled the condom on.

She couldn’t help being stunned at the size of him. She also couldn’t help coming to her senses about their ugly surroundings. “This is really cheap and sleazy,” she said, as he picked her up again.

“I know.” He grinned. “Ain’t it grand?” And he lowered her slowly onto his cock, kissing her as she reacted with a helpless moan. “You’re so tight. So hot. So delicious. Mmm.”

“I’m such a slut!”

He chuckled, nuzzling her neck. “Yeah, that’s right. Feel guilty about it, feel dirty. ‘Cause I’m gonna make you come anyway and a filthy, screaming orgasm is the best kind there is. Okay, honey?” He backed her against a wall and gave it to her hard, the way she needed it right now.

She needed passion. She needed to be with someone so excited by her that he could barely control himself. She needed so desperately to be wanted.

Devon supported her now with his right arm and used his left to pin her wrists above her head, driving into her almost violently, taking her to the edge and then beyond. The heat and the friction and the sense of the forbidden built to a crest. Then he bit her nipple lightly through her dress and she lost control, spasming around him.

“That’s right, darlin’. That’s beautiful. Give it to me, give me all you’ve got.” It was his turn to groan, now, as he took himself to the hilt inside of her, once and twice and a third, final time. He cursed softly as he came and held her to him tightly until every last tremor between them subsided.

Kylie leaned her head against the wall, her eyes unfocused. Devon kissed her neck and finally put her down, not that she could stand on her own two feet at the moment. She slid down in a boneless heap.

Dev leaned on the supply cart, panting. “You are something else, sweetheart.”

She nodded. “I’m now officially a tramp.”

He frowned at her. “If you feel this conflicted about things, why did you proposition me to begin with?”

“It’s complicated,” she said, pulling her dress over her thighs. At least she hadn’t thought once about Jack. “Why did you come looking for me? I thought you said that you wouldn’t bang me if I were the last chick on the planet. Not if the fate of the free world hung in the balance.”

Dev shrugged. “Clearly I’m not superhero material.”

“I don’t know about that.” She shot him a sidelong glance.

“We aim to please, here at McKee, Inc.” He winked at her.

“Devon, how are we going to go into the rehearsal dinner without everyone knowing what we just did?”

He pursed his lips. “People knowing is a problem for you?”

“Yes! I’m really not this type of girl.”

“The riddle again. So it was my animal magnetism that toppled you from your nice-girl pedestal?”

“Absolutely.”

“Why am I not buying this? Why do I have a feeling that you had some twisted female agenda of your very own?”

She gave him a look of limpid innocence.

He snorted. “All right. Now, I’m going to sneak out of here and find a pack of cigarettes. My official story is that I went out for a smoke and lost track of the time. You, on the other hand, got a business call. So you go back in still ‘talking’ to someone on your cell phone and then hang up and apologize to your table. I’ll saunter in about five minutes later, looking surprised that the meal has started. Does that work for you?”

She nodded and got to her feet, smoothing her dress. She found her purse and dug out her lipstick and compact, repairing the damage he’d done.

He watched her silently while he readjusted his own clothes and disposed of the condom. “Okay. One final thing, Kylie Kent.”

“What’s that?”

His dark eyes crinkled at the corners as he gave her a dazzling smile. “Well, I’d like your phone number, of course.”

She froze for a moment, then shook her head decisively as the smile dropped off his face. “Oh, no, no, no. No offense—you were great—but I don’t think that’s a good idea at all.”

And Kylie bolted out of the supply closet, once again leaving him speechless.

4

OUTSIDE, DEV SUCKED HARD on his Marlboro Red and squinted at the duck in front of him. It tilted its head and stared at him out of black eyes that would have been menacing on any other creature.

“You want bread. I want a phone number. Life sucks, buddy. That’s all I can tell you.” Dev blew smoke out of his mouth and nostrils, feeling like a disgruntled animal himself—some sort of hairy, two-legged dragon.

The duck opened its beak and expelled a hiss of displeasure before turning its tail feathers on him and waddling to the edge of a man-made pond.

A couple of smaller ducks bobbed on the surface of the water. Big Duck sailed toward them grumpily, then without notice flapped his wings and climbed onto one of the others, shoving her half under the water. Rustling and squawking ensued. It took Dev a minute to clue in.

“Dude,” he said, shaking his head. “That’s just wrong.” At least his woman had been willing. “And you could, at a minimum, buy her dinner first.”

After the unromantic, er, ducking, the female emerged outraged and shook herself off, clearly wanting nothing further to do with Big Duck.

“Feeling used?” Dev asked. “Me, too.” He finished his cigarette and left the butt in the sand on top of a trash receptacle. “Except you’re not stupid enough to want his phone number after that kind of treatment.”

It did occur to him that cosmic payback was a bitch. That women all over the city of Miami—and probably the whole state of Florida—would find his predicament funny and satisfying.

The leather pants stuck to his legs in the humidity, and he again cursed himself for wearing them. But he didn’t own a suit and the two pairs of dress slacks he did own were dirty. Dev shoved his aviators up his nose and reluctantly went inside to join the party, damp patches and all.

Kylie sat cool and elegant at a table three away from his, looking like a modern Grace Kelly. Not a soul in the room would believe he’d had her moaning in a utility closet. He almost didn’t believe it himself.

He glowered at her from behind the aviators as he seated himself with Adam and Pete and the other groomsmen, but she didn’t spare him a glance.

“What’s with the shades?” their old college friend Jay asked. “Did I miss the paparazzi?”

“He’s crying,” Pete suggested. “He crashed and burned with the hot blonde over there.”

Dev snatched the sunglasses off his face and shoved them into the breast pocket of his blazer. He turned his scowl onto Pete. “I did not crash and burn.”

“Devon, I saw her walk away from you. I saw your mouth hanging open like a guppy’s. So just admit it—you’ve lost your touch.”

“Along with some of his hair,” Adam added.

The table of guys erupted into laughter.

“Go to hell,” Dev said, grinning and, in spite of himself, putting a hand up to his head. Still bristling with frolicking follicles, thank God. “You’re just bitter.”

“Bitter, he claims!” Pete waved his fork. “Why, because in college, the Gig used to leave no women standing for the rest of us?”

The Gig. His old college nickname was very unwelcome right now. Dev ignored the hot slab of beef on his plate—it felt too much like a brother. He went to work battling the almond slivers that had slyly infiltrated the perfectly good green beans. Then he uprooted the parsley encroaching on his potatoes.

“I wasn’t under the impression you wanted the women standing,” he retorted. “So I left them on their backs for you.”

Silence ensued.

“The sheer arrogance of that statement takes my breath away,” Jay marveled. He was the writer among them.

“Good. ‘Cause we don’t want no stinkin’ poetry out of your mouth, Shakespeare.” Dev squinted at him much as he had at the duck.

“Wait, wait, wait. You’re skillfully leading us away from the main topic,” Pete pointed out. “Which is that you went down in flames with that woman.”

More like up in flames. But Dev stayed silent. Why, he didn’t know. He didn’t owe her anything, not even privacy. But he kept his mouth closed.

Unfortunately every groomsman at the table simultaneously looked over at Kylie to evaluate the one female immune to the great Gig’s seductive powers.

And she noticed.

Oh, hell.

She also heard the male laughter erupt once again, and saw them ribbing him. Judging by her frosty, disdainful expression, she assumed the worst: that he was giving them all a detailed description of the encounter in the utility closet—and that he was doing so as some sort of payback for her not dishing out her phone number.

Dev slid down a few inches in his chair. Then he snagged a passing waiter and requested a gravy boat full of rum for his Coke.

RAGE PULSED THROUGH every nerve ending Kylie possessed as she sliced her filet mignon into ribbons. It was surprisingly tender, and she dragged each slice through a hearty lake of portobello/red-wine sauce before consuming it a little too ferociously.

Her sister Jocelyn and her husband Richard didn’t notice, having eyes only for their son and his bride, and Mark’s little sister Melinda seemed withdrawn and preoccupied.

Across the table, Aunt Mildred lifted a penciled-on eyebrow, but Kylie barely noticed. Through Mildred’s beautifully swirled, spidery cone of hair, she saw Devon McKee guiltily avert his gaze from hers.

So Dev had initiated a regular Penthouse Forum over there at his table, had he? Why should she be surprised? She’d chosen him for his stud qualities, not for his maturity, diplomatic or social skills.

Still … for some reason, she’d expected better of him, maybe because he’d been man enough to apologize for his earlier comments. But clearly man did not equate to gentleman.

Mmm. And you’ve been such the lady this evening, yourself.

Kylie, unable to refute her conscience, simply worked herself into a greater rage. But it felt better than the depressive slump she’d been in lately.

“You’re looking a little feverish, my darling,” Aunt Mildred suggested. “Are you feeling quite all right?”

“I’m fine,” Kylie growled, stabbing a forkful of green beans. The slivered almond on top jumped to its death onto the plate in the face of her fury.

“You’re sure?”

“Yes. Tell me about your cruise, Auntie.”

Mildred brightened as she fumbled in her purse with something that rattled. “It was lovely, just lovely. We sailed out of Barcelona, as you know, and the next stop was Marseille where I purchased this darling little French sailor’s hat, which would probably look better on you than it does on me.” Mildred extended her bony hand and took Kylie’s, forcing her to release her grip on her steak knife.

“What—”

Mildred released two small pills into her palm. “These will help with the cramps,” she said in a stage whisper.

Mortified, Kylie ignored the smirks of the cousins to either side of her. “I’m not— I don’t—” Dear God, could the evening get any worse?

Mildred smiled and nodded at her. “Take them.”

“Thank you, but no.” She didn’t know what they were, and she didn’t need them. Despite the fact that her head was beginning to pound, Kylie slipped them into her pocket, and took a large, fortifying swallow of wine instead. Then another.

She finished dismembering her steak and washed it down with more wine while the smirking cousins exhausted the subject of the weather and bravely broached politics. Finally, no longer smirking, they gave up trying to make small talk with her, and she with them.

The steak was followed by coffee that burned her mouth and a flan that seemed actively afraid of her, judging by its cowardly quivers.

Before Kylie could take a bite of it, her brother-in-law Richard stood to make a speech.

“I want to thank you all for coming this weekend, especially you out-of-towners, to celebrate this joyous occasion of Mark’s marriage to Kendra. When he first brought her home to meet us, I said to my wife Jocelyn, ‘Kendra’s the one.’ She’s beautiful, she’s smart, she’s a sweetheart. She’s a lot like you, honey.”

Beside him, Kylie’s older sister Jocelyn preened, and all the women in the room sighed.

Kylie found her rage melting into sentiment and girly-goo at Kendra and Mark’s happiness, and Jocelyn and Richard’s, too. But all too soon, the girly-goo spawned a horrifying, shameful self-pity.

It could have been, should have been, Kylie’s and Jack’s wedding before this one.

Oh, stop it. Jack is a jerk. And surely, you are not this small and this mean. Be happy for Mark.

“Two years later,” Richard continued, “here we are. So I was right! Then again, just ask Jocelyn. I’m always right, right, honey?”

The room rumbled with low laughter while Jocelyn lifted her eyes heavenward and said, “Yes, dear.”

“In fact, I haven’t been wrong since 1972, the one and only time I stopped and asked for directions. But I digress. Back to Mark and Kendra and their very happy day …”

Kylie looked at her wineglass as a tide of unwelcome emotion washed from her stomach to her throat and then receded, leaving nausea in its wake. If she could have dived into the wine and drowned herself in it, she would have.

She still remembered the two-foot-high stack of bridal magazines she’d once happily pored over, anticipating the day that she and Jack would celebrate their own wedding.

She also remembered how heavy they were when she picked up the entire stack and staggered outside to the Dumpster. She hadn’t had the strength to throw all of them into it at once, so she’d lobbed them one by one into the big metal bin until her arm ached. She’d pictured all of those glossy, grinning, two-dimensional brides landing with satisfying splats in mounds of coffee grounds, eggshells and putrid leftovers.